Archives For Johnny Manziel

Johnny Manziel was the best player in college football last year. I will accept no other nominations. He won the Heisman his freshman year. No one else has EVER done that, and I won’t even begin to look at his stats.

I don’t remember seeing a guy with his playmaking ability. And before you start posting clips of Tebow and Cam in college, I would argue that they were pure, athletic specimens. Granted Manziel is an incredible athlete as well, but he possesses something beyond just raw athleticism. He has a knack for the big play. He has the feel, for me, of an offensive Honey Badger. He just always seems to be there to make the big play when his team needs it. Hopefully, ole Johnny Football will do a better job at staying away from trouble (although some of his off the field issues already, even before his success, concern me).

This is what I really want to talk about though – Johnny was the best player in college football last year, but at the beginning of August, he wasn’t even clearly the best quarterback on his own team!

Throughout the spring, it was a four-way battle to replace first round pick Ryan Tannehill: Johnny Boy, Jameill Showers, Matt Joeckel, and true freshman Matt Davis. Though, the battle seemed to really be between Manziel and Showers.

Sure he was the only one on that list to have any kind of FBS experience, but still. We are not talking about just a couple of average QBs duking it out for a spot; we are talking about the HEISMAN TROPHY WINNER!!! Shouldn’t that decision be crystal clear?

Finally on August 15, Sumlin announced that Manziel would take the first team reps up until the Louisiana Tech Game:

“Johnny has performed the best at this stage and we will proceed until the season opener with him getting the first-team reps.”

Sumlin said in another statement:

“My policy is simple really; the best player plays. Competition is a great thing and we need more competition at all of our positions. All of our quarterbacks have competed well, and I expect them to continue to push Johnny.”

It is almost comical to look back now and read these articles from when the Aggies were unsure of who their quarterback would be. It is even more enjoyable to look back and read stupid people’s comments about the future unknown quarterback.

Here is a gem from @v2the4:

“…growing pains for Sumlin and his offensive coordinator, Kliff Klingsbury…they were spoiled the last four years by having Case Keenum under center, but at tamu, not only dont you have a qb, but you only have one WR to count on right now in Ryan Swoope…”

Man, you look like an idiot.

However, More than any of the idiocy or madness that seems to continually swirl around Johnny Football, this is my main point: he won the Heisman, but he also almost lost the starting position on his own team. Had he not come back in the fall and listened to his coaches, we may have never gotten a glimpse at the phenomenon that is Johnny Football.

Here is what Kingsbury had to say right after Manziel was announced the starter,

“He was making some plays in the spring but he was pretty reckless with the ball.”

Kliff would also add,

“He just came back to camp and was making really quick decisions, protecting the football really well.”

He listened to his coaches and made some changes in being more cautious with the football. It appears that is what pushed Sumlin and staff over the edge to go with the redshirt freshman.

So I cannot help but wonder… how many more potential Heisman winners did not take their coach’s advice and ended up on the bench, never to take a snap? How many potential offensive record setters just tried to rely on their talent and remained reckless, so the coach went with the reliable veteran instead of the young gunslinger? How many legends just never got a chance?

Now I realize this is a unique situation. I know that Sumlin’s system provides a great opportunity for unreal numbers. I know that you would say that Johnny would have eventually gotten his shot, even if not this year, and we would have seen then, but I still can’t help but wonder, “What if?”

If it wasn’t crystal clear for Sumlin that he was watching a Heisman trophy winner practice right in front of his eyes, then I would venture to guess it could have happened to another coach.

I realize this is all speculation. There is no way to ever know what might have been for these lost Heisman winners, or if they even exist.

I could very well be completely wrong, but I could just as easily be completely right.

What if Texas A&M hadn’t joined the SEC? What if the Heisman Trophy winner had played the 2012 season against predominantly Big 12 opponents? What if?

Well… here’s what if:

Johnny Manziel would have had the single greatest college football season OF ALL TIME.

I’m not the type to make arbitrary statements. I asked myself these same questions and researched the applicable statistics. And then, well… and then I realized…

Johnny Manziel would have had the single greatest college football season OF ALL TIME.

Here’s how…

First, I looked at Texas A&M’s opponents this year and how those opponents did against every other team they played. Specifically, I looked out how many yards and points they allowed in those games.

So, here’s Texas A&M’s 2012 opponents, with the yards they allowed per game (“YAPG”) and the points they allowed per game (“PAPG”):

Opponent

YAPG

PAPG

Florida

283.42

12.92

SMU

400.25

27.00

South Carolina St.

N/A

N/A

Arkansas

409.92

30.42

Ole Miss

385.00

28.50

Louisiana Tech

526.08

38.50

LSU

296.17

16.92

Auburn

420.50

28.33

Mississippi State

389.92

22.42

Alabama

246.00

10.33

Sam Houston St.

N/A

N/A

Missouri

390.67

28.42

In order to obtain a more applicable statistic, I adjusted the YAPG and PAPG for each of Texas A&M’s opponents. These adjusted statistics remove each team’s game against Texas A&M, so that it gives a more accurate depiction of what the team did against every team other than Texas A&M. So here’s Texas A&M’s 2012 opponents, with their adjusted yards and points allowed per game:

Opponent

Adjusted YAPG

Adjusted PAPG

Florida

278.82

12.55

SMU

381.64

25.09

South Carolina St.

N/A

N/A

Arkansas

382.09

27.91

Ole Miss

376.29

28.36

Louisiana Tech

512.27

36.64

LSU

285.82

16.73

Auburn

397.73

25.18

Mississippi State

362.37

21.00

Alabama

230.36

8.63

Sam Houston St.

N/A

N/A

Missouri

367.37

25.64

Side Note: Yes- Removing the Texas A&M game from Alabama’s schedule would have lowered their points allowed per game to a nearly unfathomable 8.63 points a game.

Moving on…

Then, I looked at Texas A&M’s actual performance, in yards and points, against those teams in comparison to how many yards and points those teams typically allowed. Here’s Texas A&M’s actual performance against their opponents in 2012:

Opponent

Yards (Adjusted YAPG)

Points (Adjusted PAPG)

Florida

334 (278.82)

17 (12.55)

SMU

605 (381.64)

48 (25.09)

South Carolina St.

N/A

N/A

Arkansas

716 (382.09)

58 (27.91)

Ole Miss

481 (376.29)

30 (28.36)

Louisiana Tech

678 (512.27)

59 (36.64)

LSU

410 (285.82)

19 (16.73)

Auburn

671 (397.73)

63 (25.18)

Mississippi State

693 (362.37)

38 (21.00)

Alabama

418 (230.36)

29 (8.63)

Sam Houston St.

N/A

N/A

Missouri

647 (367.37)

59 (25.64)

Next, I had to compare that to how Johnny Football did in each of those games, so here’s Johnny Manziel’s stats, total yards gained and total touchdowns scored, in each game this year:

Opponent

Manziel’s Total Yards

Manziel’s Total Touchdowns

Florida

233

1

SMU

418

6

South Carolina St.

252

5

Arkansas

557

4

Ole Miss

320

2

Louisiana Tech

576

6

LSU

303

0

Auburn

350

5

Mississippi State

440

2

Alabama

345

2

Sam Houston St.

367

5

Missouri

439

5

Totals

4,600

43

Now comes the fun part. I removed all non-FBS games (South Carolina State and Sam Houston State) and determined percentages, which represented (1) Texas A&M’s total yards gained in relation to their opponents average yards allowed per game and (2) Texas A&M’s points scored in relation to their opponents average points allowed per game. The percentage for Texas A&M’s yards gained was 159%, and the percentage for Texas A&M’s points scored was 191%. In other words, Texas A&M gained 59% more yards and scored 91% more points than their opponents typically allowed.

Further, I had to determine Manziel’s total contribution to the offense this year. After dividing Texas A&M’s total offense by Manziel’s total yards gained in each game, and then averaging all of the games to figure out his percentage of contribution per game, I determined that 70.8% of the offense per game was attributable to Manziel. Using the same process, I determined he was also responsible for 47.1% of Texas A&M’s points scored per game.

So, next, I had to apply these statistics to Texas A&M’s schedule if they were still in the Big 12.

If Texas A&M had not made the switch to the SEC, here is what their 2012 schedule* would have most likely looked like:

Opponent

2012 YAPG

2012 PAPG

SMU

400.25

27.00

Arkansas

409.92

30.42

Louisiana Tech

526.08

38.50

Missouri

390.67

28.42

Oklahoma

381.36

24.82

Oklahoma State

409.09

28.36

Baylor

509.73

38.55

Texas Tech

367.25

31.83

Texas

417.73

28.27

Iowa State

444.83

23.33

Kansas

466.82

34.00

Kansas State

371.00

20.82

*I determined this schedule by combining their old projected conference schedule (not including West Virginia or TCU) with the first non-conference games they scheduled (SMU, Arkansas, and Louisiana Tech).

So, I derived a formula for determining Manziel’s total yards gained in each game:

For instance, Kansas allowed 466.82 yards per game this year. Plugging that into the formula with Texas A&M’s performance percentage (which for yards we know is 159%) and Manziel’s contribution percentage (70.8%), we get:

466.82 x 159% x 70.8% = 525.51

So, according to my formula, Manziel would have gained 525.51 total yards against Kansas. Similarly, here’s the same basic formula for Manziel’s points per game:

Applying these formulas to each game, here’s Johnny Football’s stats for 2012 in the Big 12 (numbers rounded to the nearest hundredth):

Opponent

Manziel’s Total Yards Gained

Manziel’s Points Scored

SMU

418*

36*

Arkansas

557*

24*

Louisiana Tech

576*

36*

Missouri

439*

30*

Oklahoma

429.30

22.97

Oklahoma State

460.52

26.25

Baylor

573.81

35.68

Texas Tech

413.42

29.46

Texas

470.25

26.16

Iowa State

500.75

21.59

Kansas

525.51

31.47

Kansas State

417.64

19.27

Totals

5,781.21 Yards

338.85 (~56.48 Touchdowns)

*I did not apply the formula to games Texas A&M actually played this year, I just used Manziel’s actual stats in those games.

Thus, according to my unqualified opinion, and assuming a lot of variables, Johnny Manziel would have had 5,781 yards and 56 touchdowns in 2012 during the 12-game regular season. He would have gained 1,181 more yards and scored 13 more touchdowns than he actually did this year.

But, that’s not all historians include in the stats…

As of 2002, single season records include postseason statistics. So, I’m going to take my assumptions one step (or maybe several steps) further. I think Texas A&M wins every single one of those games. Which, puts them in the National Championship*, playing an undefeated… Alabama. Alabama’s only loss came from Texas A&M, and we removed them from the SEC, remember? And as to how that National Championship game would go, well, we all know what happened when Texas A&M actually played Alabama…

*Yes, I know Notre Dame would be undefeated, but I think the computers would have given the number 2 spot to Texas A&M, placing Notre Dame at number 3, and subsequently, out of the National Championship game.

So, if you add Manziel’s actual performance against Alabama, 345 total yards and 2 touchdowns, that would give Manziel 6,126 total yards and 58 total touchdowns for the 2012 season. With 6,126 total yards, Johnny Football would have broken the record for total offense in a single season, which is currently held by B.J. Symons with 5,976 yards (2003). It would also place him only 4 touchdowns shy of Colt Brennan’s record of 63 touchdowns in a season (2006).

So, in conclusion, if Texas A&M had been in the Big 12 this year, Johnny Manziel would have broken the record for total offense in a single season, won the Heisman, and won the National Championship. In other words…

Johnny Manziel would have had the single greatest college football season OF ALL TIME.